Always Strive to Improve!

When people decide to run an online business or to add an online aspect to an offline business, for many that means stepping into the unknown.

Skills that they have honed over years have to be adjusted for online communication and etiquette differences. New skills have to be learned. It doesn’t help that there is a bombardment of information to sort through. Plotting a course forward can be daunting and confusing.

Here’s the thing you should realise….

Everyone who is working online successfully was in that same place within the last 20 years or so. Actually, we are all infants in online marketing quite simply because online marketing is a pretty new channel and is in it’s infancy itself.

Everyone was a newbie. Almost everyone has had false starts where they went along a route that led to a dead end. Almost every successful marketer has had a few failed experiments behind them.

But, that is what makes them successful. The mindset is one of constant improvement. There is, however, both internal and external improvement.

Internal Improvement

Internal improvement is investing in one’s self. Finding out what you need to learn and finding where you can learn it.
Improving you knowledge and understanding is fundamental.

Don’t imagine that a $5 WSO is going to give you the keys. Most of those are “methods” not business models. I am not saying that all of them are without value. You can pick up some good nuggets from the better trainers out there but it is unlikely you will take that “method” and build a sustainable long term business from it. No, if you want a shortcut, you need to learn properly.

Having a coach or a mentor costs more than a bunch of WSOs but, if you get the right one for you, it can be the massive shortcut to success that most folk dream of as they log into Paypal to buy yet another $5 way to make $100 a day.

Internal improvement is also about developing the correct mindset for success. Not seeing roadblocks as insurmountable. Not getting dispirited when things don’t all go swimmingly. Being able to pick yourself up, dust your self down and start back on the journey again.

Again, having a coach or a mentor is the best way to make sure that your mindset is right.

You need to be curious.
A curious mind is one that is open to improvement. This goes beyond just mindset. Be curious about traffic sources, engagement methods, lead generation methods, optimizing sales processes, testing different funnels. These are where you find the little breakthroughs that can transform a business.

External Improvement

External improvement is investing in the right tools to enable you to move towards your business goals. As your business starts to build, you will need to re-invest a proportion of your profits into improved tools.

I don’t mean buying shiny object rubbish that looks really cool on the sales page but will make you nothing in terms of profit. I mean investing in professional tools. Tools that will do one of two things. Save you a whole bunch of time and enable you to do something quickly and easily (automation tools like Zapier or web page development tools like Convertri) or will directly improve your business (like having a proper sales cart and customer management system).

Here’s an example…

Loads of people start out on crappy, cheap, limited shared hosting….and there’s nothing wrong with starting there. When your business starts to grow, however, you will need to upgrade to a VPS – Faster, cleaner, more control. That is professional hosting for a professional business.

At the end of the day, one really good tool that will serve your business well as you take it to the next level will be worth a thousand times the crappy, unsupported shiny object plug-ins you find sold through JVZoo

So, the takeaway from this post is to invest in improvements and, in doing so, grow your business. It is the difference between amateurs and professionals.

So, are you serious or just messing around at this?
Strive to be professional every single day.